[pank2002]

Hey,
This bit annoys me quite a bit. I reported a ebay auction as being a scam. I’m like 98% certain it’s a scam since it hat copied everything from a previously auction held on eBay. This could only be accessed via the google cache.
When you report a scam-auction you can of course not tell them why you think it’s fake. I could link to the google cache.
I was also in contact with the seller and received a photo which I believe is photoshopped, but I’m not sure. I can PM it to somebody who feels they have knowledge on this subject.

I contacted eBaythrough live chat yesterday and all the guy could tell me was that they probably had it under control, but he really didn’t know...

So, I took matters into my own hands and contacted the winner. I surely don’t hope the winner tells the guy who held the auction about the incident, since the seller has my email-address. I’m sure it was the right thing to do, but eBay might not think so...

Anyway, I just need to get this off my chest. It has been a very frustrating process since ebay did next to nothing although they had more than 5 days to investigate this.

-Rasmus

 

[Dimitris]

You did the right thing!I wouldnt worry if i were you. In case someone threatens you I am offering to come over and beat the hell out of him together if you can track him!

 

[pank2002]

Greece is nice

I like Greece! Good food too — most of the time.

Anyway, I’m not scared of getting threats. He know my email address and in which country I live. He don’t even know my zip code, so

What he can do, though, is spam my email to hell. Gmail has a good spam filter though. He can also tell ebay that I’m an *******, but, really, I believe he is the con artist around here, and thus wouldn’t want to get too much attention on himself.

 

[Jose Perez]

ebay's biggest problem continues to be their refusal to admit that they have some serious problems. They continue to send out meaningless press releases and messages to their users about how they're tracking down the bad guys that use their service but continue to allow users with TENS OF THOUSANDS of negative feedback to exploit their service and the community of buyers.

They really need to get serious about cracking down on scam artists and junk peddlers, if for no other reason than its the right thing to do.

 

[morphie]

Personally its rare I have problems with eBay, and when I do its generally quickly solved. I guess French eBay works better or something...

I haven't noticed many people with alot of negative feedback btw...

 

[socrates63]

An experience I had with eBay a few months ago with regard to my attempts to contact a seller for warranty service... I know my particular experience is of a different nature than the situation described by OP but I thought I'd share my experience with the eBay staff.

I bought a laptop battery last year on eBay and the seller touted a one-year warranty. After about 8 months, the battery leaked.

I sent mail to the seller via eBay's messaging feature. I received no reply to any of my mail. I then requested eBay for the seller contact information. I sent email directly to the seller, and still received no response. I then tried the telephone number provided by eBay. The number was disconnected.

The seller was still active on eBay and was a power seller. I informed eBay of the situation, and after a couple of mails with eBay, eBay got the seller to update his contact info.

I called the seller and received a replacement battery promptly.

It took a few weeks to fully resolve the issue but everything was resolved to my satisfaction. Most of the time was spent on my end waiting for the seller to reply to my emails. Once eBay stepped in and threatened to revoke the seller's account for not updating the contact info, it only took a week for things to work out.

 

[kramer5150]

I like ebay... just gotta be carefull and know how to sniff out scammers, but even then there is still a risk of getting scammed. Ive gotten some very good deals on my Grado, Alessandro, and sony cans.

IMHO ebay should do more to axe repeated poor performers. I see sellers with 200-300 hundred negative feedbacks in the past 30 days... What... whats the point of having a feedback system?

Ive used craigs list to buy stuff locally too.
Garrett

 

[bln]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pank2002 I’m like 98% certain it’s a scam since it hat copied everything from a previously auction held on eBay.

Where's your proof?

 

[Jahn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bln Where's your proof?

Sometimes because I'm lazy I'll use someone else's description of an item, it's a cut and paste jobby from someone else's auction. But if they took the pic from the other auction and said that the item was theirs, including the condition of the item, then that's misrepresentation...

 

[hciman77]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pank2002 Hey, This bit annoys me quite a bit. I reported a ebay auction as being a scam. I’m like 98% certain it’s a scam since it hat copied everything from a previously auction held on eBay. This could only be accessed via the google cache.

I have seen this done a lot especially with common items such as printers, cellphones and so on. I saw one seller who did this on all his items - copied pictures and text. I reported this and informed the sellers of the original items and eBay did screw all about it. Out of interest I monitored the sellers feedback and he really did have the items for sale and got positive feedback for them. So it does not necessarily mean there is an intent to deceive. I do not think copyright exists on eBay copy.

 

[StevieDvd]

I was checking feedback on a seller and found that virtually every other sale she had done was a CD or DVD and she blatantly stated that it was watched or listened to before copying it and listing the original for sale

Will not be buying from her, what a cheek!

 

[Ozric]

While eBay has been a positive experience for me both as buyer and seller, I do agree that they don't do much about rampant dishonesty on part of many sellers.

I have a sneaking suspicion that one seller whose auction I just won is using shill bidding on occasion to hike up the price of some of his auctions. When I was first bidding on one of his items, a military-style watch, some idiot kept pushing up the price so that an item which had pretty consistently gone for around $35 ended at $50 (won by someone else). The guy has zero feedback, and when I check his details, he registered two days prior in Canada, where the seller is also from. Could be a coincidence.

I eventually won another of the same seller's auctions, but kept watching his items to see if there was a suspicious pattern. The same week, on a similar auction, there was another bidder from Canada with zero feedback who had pushed up the price, this time to $70; he had registered the same day as when the auction ended. Coincidence? This time, though, the bidder ended up winning the auction. I need to watch and see if any "feedback" is exchanged, but often that means nothing.

 

[markl]

I recently had my ebay ID hi-jacked by two separate scam artists. They each replaced the contents of a few of my listings with their own scam auctions, using my good name and record to attract bidders. Luckily, I check on my auctions several times throughout the day and caught these almost as soon as they happened. They include language in their scam auctions that you are NOT to contact the member of ebay whose auction this is (which would alert me to the fraud), but instead, you contact a separate e-mail address contained in the new listing with questions and your paypal payments. It's outrageous. One of my hi-jackers actually has a major computer web-site linked to in the sham auction, this is a real retailer who sells computers and computer accessories. Shocking!

As cliche as it sounds, I felt "violated"; I've never had any form of identity theft so far in my life before this.

In working with the e-bay drones who try to assuage your fears and take care of the "problem", it became 100% clear to me that these clowns are totally unable to do THING ONE about any of these identity theft problems. There's like a boiler-room somewhere of 20-30 people who "respond" to these problems, and there is NO FOLLOW-UP on any of your complaints whatsoever. They tell you that they aren't allowed to tell you what actions (if any) they will take against your hackers. Even though I had e-mail addresses and even entire web-sites to give them to identify my hackers, there is NO DOUBT in my mind that will do absolutely NOTHING about this.

I'm sure ebay just sees this as a cost of doing business. I asked them how often this sort of thing happens and they said it was "extremely rare". BullSH*T! If this could happen to me, it can happen to you. I have since taken extraordinary actions to protect my computer and all my accounts and passwords everywhere on the planet and so far, so good. It should NOT have to be this way...

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

 

[hciman77]

Quote:

Originally Posted by StevieDvd I was checking feedback on a seller and found that virtually every other sale she had done was a CD or DVD and she blatantly stated that it was watched or listened to before copying it and listing the original for sale Will not be buying from her, what a cheek!

You should worry matey. I bough a set of Robin of Sherwood DVDs (for the wife !) and they turned out to be crude Korean copies from a soon to be disappearing seller.

 

[braillediver]

They do $50,000,000 a day (old numbers) in mostly small auctions. They can’t possibly address every issue and you do state that you “think” it’s a scam.

Ebay’s only as good as the people who use it.


Mitch